Fireflies
by x-SystemRestore
Summary: His dreams were his only escape... Steven Stone centered/One-shot


**A/N **_Another spontaneous idea that popped into my head a few hours ago. The inspiration came from listening to "Fireflies" by Owl City. It's a really beautiful song in my opinion. So yeah, if you guys could, I would recommend reading this fic while listening to that song. While I'm not sure if it'll ruin your "reading" experience, there's no hurt in trying I suppose. _

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**Fireflies**

The cool night air blew softly against him. His silver colored hair gently tickled his forehead and his cheeks as he got off his Metagross. He sighed tiredly, running his hand through his hair. Metagross took notice of this and groaned softly. Steven turned to his pokemon and smiled rather weakly as he mustered up enough strength to gently rub the steel cross over Metagross' face. He silently thought to himself, 'I'll be fine,' and he hoped that the steel clad pokemon would understand him just by his gestures.

He zapped Metagross back into its pokeball and clipped it onto his waist, where his other pokeballs were. Steven rubbed the back of his neck tiredly as he trudged into his small home. He fished around for the key in his pocket. When he finally grabbed the cool metal of the steel key, he let out another sigh as he inserted it into the keyhole. The door clicked open and he stepped inside the dark house. He stood there for a while, his eyelids feeling heavier by the second. The house was a complete mess. Open notebooks were strewn all over the glossy hardwood floors as well as hand lens, various evolution stones, as well as thick research books.

Steven shut the front door behind him and headed over to the kitchen. He took off the black blazer he wore and placed it on the counter. His mind was a blank as he opened up the refrigerator door.

_'Milk, orange juice, soda,' _he thought to himself as he moved the bottles aside. He stopped when he saw a bottle of red wine in the back. Steven hesitated for a while. He had bought the wine for the purpose of drinking it whenever he wanted to, however at that moment he did not feel any incentive to drink any sort of alcoholic beverage. After nearly a minute of thinking about it, he grabbed the bottle. The silver bands he wore on his fingers made a little sound as they contacted with the glass of the bottle.

He set the bottle down on the kitchen counter and went to get a wine glass. Carefully, he popped the cork and watched the red-purple liquid pour out into the glass. He filled it up halfway and he set the wine bottle down. Gently he took the slender neck of the glass and navigated his way around the strewn research papers on the floor to his small sofa.

Steven plopped down on the sofa and let out a tired sigh. He untied the red kerchief around his neck and unbuttoned the first three buttons on his dress shirt. It was tiring to wear such formal clothes all the time.

He brought the wine glass up to his lips and he tilted his head back just slightly so that the red liquid would flow into his mouth. His throat moved slightly with each gulp. Steven brought the wine glass back down and saw that he had drank most of it already. Only a small puddle of red wine was left at the bottom. Somehow, this struck him as an amusing thought as he swished the liquid around the glass, chuckling softly.

The day he had was no different from any other day he had. In the morning he had left for Evergrande to check for any challenges on that day. If he were lucky, he'd get only three challenges all timely placed past noon. Afterwards he would go to Rustboro on his father's whims and play the role of the "President of Devon Corporation" for a few hours. The life of a CEO, it was incredibly boring to Steven. Then, if there were any afternoon challenges, he would go back to Evergrande and battle the challenger, all of whom lost for now. As if that wasn't enough, Wallace, his dear friend would sometimes call him and ask that he come watch his contest rehearsals. Steven knew that his friend did not even need rehearsals in order to win any pokemon contest, but he went to them anyway. If he didn't go, he was sure he would get an earful later. By then, it was nearly dusk. Steven would go back to Evergrande and battle any evening challenges. He would put up the facade at the end of those battles that he was still completely pepped up with energy, when in reality he was about to die from exhaustion. Any spare time he had throughout the day, he would invest into caves and searching for stones.

Occasionally, he would let it slip that he was tired with a soft yawn or a long sigh. It was always Phoebe that expressed her deep concern for him.

"It's not good for your health, Steven dear," she would say to him. By then, Sidney and the others would chime in as well.

"She's right, Stevie. Don't push yourself too much. Not everyone can be energetic like me!"

"I do hope you will keep your health in mind, Steven."

"I shall try my best to make sure there will be virtually no challenges for you, Steven my boy! I'll defeat them right before they reach your room!"

He would simply thank them all for their concern as he left for his home in Mossdeep to turn in for the night. On the way back, he would fight with himself on staying awake. One wrong move and he could fall off Metagross during the flight.

Steven sat there silently on the sofa, mindlessly swishing the wine. He lifted the cup a bit above his head and inspected the rose colored liquid. A little smile decorated his face as he set the glass down on the coffee table in front of him. A soft groan escaped his lips as he rubbed his shoulder. It had a dull ache.

The silver haired man leant back and closed his eyes. Sometimes he would wish someone could take the championship away from him. He had tried many times to give it to his friend, Wallace, but the stubborn gym leader refused to take the _great honor_ of becoming Champion. He also wished that someone could take away the responsibility of becoming President of his father's corporation, but he knew that was not possible. His father had founded that company and brought it to its quick success. He knew that his father would be severely disappointed with him if he were to simply give the company away to someone else that was not of immediate family.

Those were his simple wishes. Steven did not like the burden of becoming his father's successor, nor did he fancy the idea of being the Champion of Hoenn any longer. Everyday he felt as if a million things were running through his mind, enough so that it would sometimes make his head hurt, but, alas he had no time to rest at all. Even during his free time, he felt the _need_ to go into the different caves in Hoenn in search of rare stones.

Steven sighed happily at the thought of sleep as he slowly closed his gray eyes. It was in his dreams that he was completely happy. No burdens, no responsibilities, no one telling him he needed to do this or do that...

Letting out his last sigh for the day, Steven allowed sleep to consume him. His neck went limp and his head fell slightly on the sofa's armrests. One of his arms were above his head, his hand contacting the cool glass of the small nightstand table beside the sofa. His other hand was limply over his abdomen. His chest rose and fell according to each individual breath. His silver hair fell rather ungracefully over his eyes. He didn't sleep on a soft bed, nor was he sleeping in the best position. Even so, his mouth was opened just very slightly so that the tips of his pearly white teeth were showing past his lips. And those same lips formed a soft smile as he slept heavily through the night...intoxicated by the wine and intoxicated by his own dreams that could never become a reality.

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**A/N **_I hope that wasn't too ambiguous or anything. _

_Steven didn't die, just in case someone thinks that. He just fell asleep. _

_Anyways, I'm writing this while I, myself, am tired as well. So hopefully there won't be too many grammatical errors. I did read it over once, but I always seem to miss some words or that one extra comma/period. _

_Read & Review as always.  
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